


Ashes to Ashes

by KaelinaLovesLomaris



Series: Whumptober 2019 - FFXV [7]
Category: Final Fantasy XV, Kingsglaive (Final Fantasy XV)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Canonical Character Death, Gen, I'm branching out, Whump, Whumptober, Whumptober 2019, time for some Nyx whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-11
Updated: 2019-12-11
Packaged: 2021-02-25 22:34:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 883
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21753082
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KaelinaLovesLomaris/pseuds/KaelinaLovesLomaris
Summary: Nyx dons the Ring of the Lucii.Part of my collection of Whumptober 2019 prompts.
Relationships: Titus Drautos | Glauca & Nyx Ulric
Series: Whumptober 2019 - FFXV [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1505405
Comments: 2
Kudos: 13





	Ashes to Ashes

**Author's Note:**

> Day 13 Prompt: Adrenaline
> 
> Warnings for introspection, canonical major character death, and zero proofreading.

Adrenaline had saved Nyx’s life more times than he could count while he was on the frontlines. It had given him the final push to make one last strike, one last warp before he hit stasis, to sprint the last few feet to shelter. It had sustained him through the last stages of battles when his strength was waning and they were out of curatives, out of soldiers, out of time.

The king’s magic helped too, igniting his blood, driving him faster, farther. He had taken to it more easily than most. Warping was exhilarating, not nauseating. The magic coursed through him fluidly, his body moving with it rather than fighting against it every step of the way. Nyx knew his grasp on the magic would never rival someone born with it in the very core of their being, never come close to matching King Regis or even Prince Noctis, despite his lack of combat testing. But Nyx was a warrior through and through. Despite what Drautos had said, he was _not_ nothing without the king’s magic.

The magic just helped.

Now it felt like all the remaining adrenaline his body could ever have produced was flooding his veins at once. The rush of magic was heady, far stronger than anything he had ever borrowed from the king, and even after such a short time of being deprived of it after the king’s death, it was a little disorienting to feel it again.

As soon as the Lucii relinquished their grasp on him, he would have a second, at the most, to shield himself and Lunafreya from Drautos’s blow. It would be enough.

Time rushed back to normal, and Nyx threw his hand up. Drautos’s sword bounced off the barrier, and he stumbled, giving Nyx an opening to throw him across the courtyard with a blast of power. He spat on the ground in Drautos’s direction, disgust at his former mentor’s betrayal still running strong.

He had knocked Drautos down just long enough to entrust Lunafreya to Libertus’s care. It hurt to deceive them both about his fate, to know that Libertus would be waiting for him and he would never arrive. But there was nothing any of them could do to change the bargain he had struck with the Lucii, so there was no point in causing them pain now. Let them cling to hope, the one thing Nyx had fought so hard for, no matter the circumstances.

Nyx turned to meet Drautos’s blow, blocking him from following them. The only thing that mattered now was preventing the Empire from getting their hands on the Ring. It belonged only on the finger of Prince, now King, Noctis. And even though no one in the Empire could wield the Ring, they still did not deserve to have it.

Despite that Insomnia was not Nyx’s home, it hurt to watch it crumble and burn around him as the kings of old fought back against the daemons summoned by Niflheim. It hurt even more to know that it was largely in part to the man he fought now, his mentor, the traitor who had slaughtered their king, a man who Nyx had looked up to for over half his life.

Nyx blazed in the fury and thrill of combat. Drautos was the most difficult foe he had ever faced; even without the enhancement from the suit of armour he donned as General Glauca, Nyx had never beaten him in a spar. But now Nyx had nothing left to lose. He was dead by sunrise anyways. He just needed to keep him from following Libertus and Lunafreya until they were far enough beyond his reach.

And if he managed to kill the traitor, well. That was just a bonus.

Insomnia was already destroyed. It was nothing more than rubble and ruins, a broken throne for a fallen kingdom. There would be little for Prince Noctis to return to, even if Lunafreya got the Ring to him, even if he managed to reclaim the Crystal and overthrow Niflheim.

Nyx knew the pain of losing everything. His home was long gone, taken by the Empire so many years ago, as they took all the outer territories of Lucis. His sister was gone, his parents. Crowe, taken by the same treachery as Insomnia. It should have thrown him into despair, might have turned him bitter like it clearly had to Drautos and so many other Glaives. But what was the point of living so ensnared in the past? There was no future in that.

Nyx blazed, in righteous fury and a frenzy of blows. He thanked Libertus for his final, likely unintentional gift, ripping his second kukri from Drautos’s shoulder to plunge it into his chest.

Nyx blazed as the fires burned around him and within him, turning the Crown City and his skin to ashes.

And as the sun rose and he felt the last of the strength he would ever have ebb away, he couldn’t bring himself to regret it. All he could do was hope that his sacrifice would not go in vain, that Lunafreya would get out, get to the prince and deliver the Ring. That King Noctis would return one day and rise above the dubious glory of his ancestors.

“Rule well, young King.”

**Author's Note:**

> Come say hi on tumblr at [prince-noctisluciscaelum](https://prince-noctisluciscaelum.tumblr.com)!


End file.
